Josh Rushing and the North Dakota Humanities Council

Tayo, NDHC board member and Bismarck State College Professor of Philosophy, at the Game Changer event in downtown Fargo, North Dakota.

I’m in my 4th year of board membership with the North Dakota Humanities Council, and it is a duty I feel a privilege to be part of. This last Thursday (10/09/2014), the NDHC kicked off the first annual Game Changer series, a signature event that will continue to be hosted every October in cities throughout North Dakota (the 2015 Game Changer will be in Bismarck). This year’s Game Changer was titled, “Between Two Worlds: America and the Mid-East,” and the NDHC brought together a collection of journalists, poets, authors, and reporters in downtown Fargo. We also received some outstanding support from Forum Communications, Ecce Art Gallery, the HoDo, The Bush Foundation, and Wells-Fargo. This funding and donation of space helped the assembled group speak to an audience throughout the day, and also to have smaller round-table discussions that evening.

After the evening round table discussion, it was photo time with Josh Rushing (r).

One of the speakers was Josh Rushing, a Marine Corps officer of 15 years and a current reporter with Al Jazeera English. I had a chance to take in Josh Rushing’s talk, and it resonated with some of my own ongoing research. I focused on Josh’s points about how the media presents stories today, and how there are infinite voices that do not make the immediate story. I thought about this in the context of the US-Dakota Wars, and how the media — the St. Paul Pioneer and the New York Times — presented a more sensationalized and monolithic version of the story in contrast to the complexities inherent on the ground and at the scene. This makes sense from a reporters standpoint, though, since they are trying to communicate a complex story in a very quick way to an audience that is already mentally and spatially disconnected from the event. At least that is one thought I had, a kind of then and now.

If you want to look into a bit of my research, you can click on this link here. Otherwise, below is about 7 minutes of video from Rushing’s talk at The Fargo Theatre from October 9, 2014. As well, if you enjoy this, and you think it is a good idea that the NDHC continue having these sorts of events, you’ll want to click here and donate. Any amount helps. One of the NDHC’s ideas is modest: we just want to create a more informed North Dakota. To do that, though, requires me to admit that there is a lot out there that I do not know. It’s Socratic in that way: I know that I don’t know, and I’m here to listen, and here to take in what others have to say, and give. But again, enough of that. Check out Rushing’s talk below. And watch “Control Room” (2004) if you want more. I’ve got “Korengal” (2014) in the Netflix queue for this Wednesday, and I’m wondering how it will build off my knowledge of “Waltz with Bashir” and “Restrepo.”